In machine guns of conventional types the ammunition belt is continuously subjected to brief and relatively large accelerations, leading to considerable stress on the belt and thereby causing an elongation or stretching thereof within the elastic range of the belt members, resulting in a change of the desired separation distance between cartridges or shells carried by the belt. This frequently causes either functional disturbances in the case of known starwheel feeders, the belt on the cartridge becoming jammed between the starwheel feeder and the wall of the belt inlet as a result of such changed separation distances between the cartridges or shells, or results in unfavorable force-transmission ratios between the teeth of the starwheel feeder and the cartridges or shells. This danger is increased if, for example, belt lengths of the order of 1 to 2 meters are required to be pulled in by the starwheel feeder.
Rotary bending or overlapping of the belt from the munition supply to belt feeder also causes increased pulling forces to be applied to the belt which, together with the stepwise accelerations to which the belt is subjected, cause an elongation thereof, the cartridges being thereby additionally displaced in a longitudinal direction with respect to the belt members enveloping them. For this reason it has been customary to date to provide centering adjustments ahead of the belt feeder, in which the cartridges are made to resume their original position to ensure a disturbance-free entrance into the belt feeder.